Wednesday, November 19, 2008

I used to run regularly—chiefly to lose weight, but like Francis below, also for the sheer pleasure of it.

Francis began to run, and in doing so, reconstituted a condition that was as pleasurable to his being as it was natural: the running of bases after the crack of the bat, the running from accusation, the running from family, from bondage, from destitution of spirit through ritualistic straightenings, the running, finally, in a quest for pure flight as a fulfilling mannerism of the spirit. (William Kennedy, Ironweed, 1979)